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Friday, July 01, 2005

Big brands dominate charitable sector
The voluntary income of the UK’s top 500 charities reached £4.9 billion during 2003/04, with Cancer Research UK ranked number one.
Find out more

UK’s top charities are ‘superleague’ employers
The UK’s top 500 fundraising charities saw a 2.9% increase in their average number of employees between 2002/03 – 2003/04. Grantmaking trusts saw their average staff number grow by 3.7% over the same period.

The Pittsburgh Social Enterprise Accelerator, an organization that helps area nonprofits become more economically sustainable, said Thursday it has added five groups, including Goodwill Industries, to its portfolio."

$115 MILLION DONATION FOR HEALTH PROGRAM STUDY WOULD BE SCHOOL'S LARGEST

By John Boudreau

Mercury News

Oracle Chief Executive Larry Ellison, who didn't have time to finish college on his way to tech riches, is close to making history at Harvard University with a $115 million donation, which would be the largest single gift ever to the prestigious school.

The donation would fund a program to study the effectiveness of global health initiatives, said Oracle spokesman Bob Wynne."

Rotary Charities has been around so long that it's hard to envision what the area would look like without it.
Over the last 27 years, the charitable arm of the Rotary Club of Traverse City has doled out more than $34 million to local groups, projects and initiatives.
From Scouts to area recreational trails and local programs to build strong families, you name it, Rotary Charities money is likely in it.
The money comes from interest on royalties the Rotary Club has earned over the last 30 years from oil and gas found on property the club bought in 1926 for a Boy Scout camp."

The Salvation Army says people are coming by their thrift store on Nolensville Road in Nashville after hours and dumping tons of garbage on their property, and they say the costs of removing it are piling up.

A Salvation Army spokesperson said people have been leaving everything from appliances to furniture to bags of trash right outside the store in order to avoid paying a dumping fee.

But the spokesperson said what the offenders don’t realize is that they’re being caught on tape.

The building next door houses a security company which uses surveillance cameras to monitor its own property, but the cameras also record what happens outside the Salvation Army store.

On Saturday, millions of people will attend the Live 8 concerts, a worldwide series of star-studded shows organized by Live Aid founder Bob Geldof to bring global attention to economic and social crises in Africa.

Another billion will experience the largest concert event ever staged by watching it on television, listening to it on the radio or streaming it online.

DETROIT, June 30 /PRNewswire/ -- The idea of a company losing all of its data to a virus is scary, but imagine if hackers can use this information for profit or to harass customers. The results could be devastating to a nonprofit whose lifeline is its donors. NPower Michigan is asking nonprofit agencies to imagine these and other disastrous scenarios, while attending the NPower Michigan Tech Security Day on July 29. NPower Michigan's Tech Security Day will begin at 9 a.m. at Focus: HOPE Conference Center located at 1400 Oakman in Detroit."

There is a trove of IT waste that exists among larger organizations -- stockrooms filled with old computing hardware deemed no longer capable of supporting the processes and applications of the business. It's electronic trash that typically ends up being stored or, worse, discarded in a landfill or offshore 'recycling' facility. Few would imagine there's any use for such obsolete gear.

But there is.

Consider those for whom IT is a scarce commodity -- charities and non-profit groups. Most don't need the advanced computing power of large enterprises or even some smaller businesses, and they'd love to get their hands on this goldmine of computing garbage.

The UK’s top 500 fundraising charities saw a 2.9% increase in their average number of employees between 2002/03 - 2003/04. Grantmaking trusts saw their average staff number grow by 3.7% over the same period. However, according to the analysis published by CAF (Charities Aid Foundation), these figures are considerably higher than the growth rate in employment across the sector as a whole."

Wealthiest Americans Have Reduced Charitable Contributions 70% Since 1998-2000 Period: "Donations Average 6 Percent of Annual Income Knocked Down By Bear Market, Contributions Failed to Rebound With Stock Prices CHICAGO, June 30 /PRNewswire/ -- The wealthiest aren't giving nearly as much these days. Charitable contributions from U.S. households with a net worth of $5 million or more, excluding primary residence, fell 70% from an average of $600,000 for the 3-year period 1998-2000 to $180,000 for the period 2002-2004, according to a new report from Spectrem Group released today. The average contribution for the most recent single year represented 6.1 percent of annual income. The wealthiest segments showed the smallest percentage declines in giving, according to the Spectrem Perspective(TM) report 'Charitable Giving and the Affluent Market.' "

Estate planning is emerging as a key service as financial advisors prepare to compete for the wealth transfer and charitable giving needs of the baby boomer generation, according to a new report.
The report, by Tiburon Strategic Advisors, notes that consumers’ investable assets are expected to grow from about $17 trillion now to about $30 trillion in 2010.
“As baby boomers get older and wealthier, their primary goals will evolve from accumulation to preservation,” the report’s authors state."

Worldpress.org - Mutula wa Kilonzo — My Story:
snip snip>>>
"Philanthropy, especially to churches, women’s and youth groups’ projects are some of the things Mutula has learned from retired president Moi.Mutula’s occasional visit to Mbooni is spent attending to villagers who stream into his compound with various problems ranging from school fees for their children to legal issues.

One neighbor explained how they always knew of his arrival. “Hapa kwake ni mlima na hatuna stima. Mzee akifika lazima genereta iwakishwe na tunaona taa. Hapo tunapigiana simu.” (This village of ours is hilly and without electricity. Whenever he comes the generator must be put on and we see the light. There we call each other.)"

Tzedakah is one of the most important mitzvot in Jewish life. And Toronto, asserts Rabbi Reuven Tradburks, spiritual leader of Kehillat Shaarei Torah and secretary of the Vaad Harabonim, is known as a community that wants to help those in need.

But while most charity collectors are honest and honourable, there are unfortunately “a few bad apples,” said Rabbi Tradburks and Tzvi Richman, chair of the newly formed Toronto Vaad Hatzdokah. Some exaggerate or even outright lie about the cause they are collecting for. They might be collecting for a perfectly genuine cause, but don’t send the money where it is supposed to go.

To help donors determine if a cause is genuine or worthy, the Toronto Vaad Hatzdokah, with the encouragement and sponsorship of the Vaad Harabonim, has designed a certificate that all meshulachim, (charity collectors) must carry. The certificate is laminated so that the signature can’t be tampered with, said Rabbi Tradburks, includes the collector’s photograph and is issued for only one to four weeks at a time."

ST. JOHN'S, Nfld. (CP) - The Nature Conservancy of Canada has completed a $10-million campaign in the Atlantic region with the protection of three properties in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The group says it has been able to protect more than 5,260 hectares of ecologically significant land in partnership with Atlantic landowners during the campaign. The new protected properties in Newfoundland are located at Sandy Point and take in a total of four hectares."

SINGAPORE : The Singapore Cancer Society says it has received many calls from the public enquiring about this Sunday's NKF Cancer Show on Channel U.

It clarified Wednesday that the show is different from the Society's own Cancer Charity Show to be shown only in October.

The NKF Cancer Show - the National Kidney Foundation's first - comes after the success of another Cancer Charity Show, which is the Singapore Cancer Society's inaugural fundraiser which raised $3.2 million last year. "

IBM releases local-impact survey: "tatewide, IBM employs more than 6,000 people, with a payroll over $500 million; IBM employees pay more than an estimated $40 million in state income, local sales and property taxes each year; IBM and its employees contributed more than $1.4 million in cash and technology to Colorado schools and local nonprofits in 2004;"

Chief executive Catherine Meloy, wearing designer clothes, strides through, pointing out details in her new store. Merchandise arranged by size and color on circular racks. Signs dangling from the ceiling pointing out departments. A bright 'kid's corral' stocked with toys and a television."

The Alliance of Arizona Nonprofits has named two new co-leaders to take over the statewide advocacy organization.

Alison Rapping and Patrick McWhortor, veterans in local and national non-profit circles, will start work this fall. They will help the alliance tackle a range of efforts, from lobbying policymakers on issues like regulation that affects the non-profit sector to helping its members more easily share information.

Thirty-six states and regions have established umbrella organizations for non-profit groups. "

Parents express reservations over possible conflict of interest Paid employees of the English Schools Foundation are to be allowed to sit on the board of governors despite reservations expressed by parents, according to a report to be made public today.

The report, concerning the reform of the ESF's governance and management, was completed following a consultation exercise which ended earlier this month.

The board will replace the 132- strong foundation as the supreme governing body. The daily operation of schools will be monitored by school councils.

During a consultation meeting last month, parents said paid staff on the board could be subjected to a conflict of interest especially when dealing with issues concerning remuneration."

To prepare for an emergency on the scale of the Word Trade Center attack or a large natural disaster, Washington-area organizations have agreed to pool resources and coordinate their responses.

A report released today by the Nonprofit Roundtable details agreements made by 18 nonprofit and two local government organizations to coordinate relief efforts in the face of a major crisis. The agreements set up a new system to address individual needs and specifically define the coordination of volunteers and donations."

After the attack on the Pentagon nearly four years ago, the area's charitable agencies faced a daunting logistical challenge. Things did not always go smoothly.

Well-meaning people donated blankets and used clothing when cash would have been more useful. Volunteers were not always directed where they were most needed. Survivors and the families of the deceased needed financial and emotional support, but no consolidated lists of help were available. Some grief-stricken survivors had to keep telling their stories again and again to different caseworkers."

Charles Robertson and his wife gave $35m to Princeton university in 1961 with the stated goal 'to strengthen the government of the United States . . . by improving the facilities for the training and education of men and women for government service'.

The gift, one of the largest given to a US university, helped expand Princeton's Woodrow Wilson Schoolof International Affairs.Decades later, the Robertsons' heirs maintain that the university has abused the gift because not enough of its graduates have gone into government service. They have sued Princeton and the case is expected to be tried next spring."

THE tsunami disaster charity appeal has created a ripple effect in charitable giving, boosting donations across the entire voluntary sector in the first six months of the year, research suggests.

Fears that the non-tsunami fundraising efforts in Britain would be hit by donor fatigue appear to be unfounded, with more than a third of charities experiencing an increase in public donations and a quarter experiencing no decline at all.

Only a quarter of the 132 leading charities surveyed by the Institute of Fundraising (IoF) said that donations have fallen in 2005, compared with last year, but most expect the drop to be short-lived"

Too many ways to divide donations? | csmonitor.com: "Too many ways to divide donations?
With 1.5 million nonprofits in the US and growing, some experts say charities should merge.
By Jeremiah Hall | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
SAN FRANCISCO – When it comes to charity, are more nonprofits necessarily better? America has always been known for its entrepreneurial spirit. Increasingly, that spirit has been mixed with a desire to help the disadvantaged. The result: a dramatic increase in the number of nonprofits. In fact nearly 500,000 have been created in the past 10 years, bringing the total to 1.5 million organizations. But some nonprofit experts are beginning to wonder if that number does more harm than good.

'The real question is how long will this growth be sustainable? At some point, we'll simply have too many and the funding won't be able to support the numbers,' says Paul Light, professor of nonprofit studies at New York University."

Suddenly, nonprofits seek profits | csmonitor.com: "Suddenly, nonprofits seek profits
By G. Jeffrey MacDonald | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
Known for producing classic plays by Ibsen, Chekhov, and Shakespeare, the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis didn't originally set out to put outrageous costumes on the backs of rowdy revelers at Mardi Gras or Halloween.

But costs upwards of $30,000 per year for costume storage led managers at the historic theater to think outside the box, or closet, as the case may be. Result: a three-year-old costume-rental business that not only pays for all storage costs but also generates extra cash flow for the Guthrie and its business partner, the Children's Theater Company."

Research into complementary medicines relies on donations from enlightened philanthropists. Let's hope we can attract more of them

Edzard Ernst
Tuesday June 28, 2005
The Guardian

I have been in medical research for about 30 years now. Rarely have I been moved so deeply as I was a few weeks ago. A man rang and explained that his wife, who had had a keen interest in complementary medicine, had just died of cancer. He suggested that, instead of flowers, the congregation at the funeral might want to donate money to our research. We clarified that my department scientifically investigates several areas of complementary medicine, including cancer. The caller then decided on the spot that a donation would be appropriate."

Associated Press
Robert Redford focuses on a globe-spanning group of 'social entrepreneurs' in the documentary series 'The New Heroes.'

Believe it or not, there are people who don't think that the only way for Silicon Valley and Hollywood to get together is through technology.

Jeff Skoll, the billionaire former president of eBay, and actor Robert Redford have teamed up for projects designed around philanthropy and filmmaking. One of the results - 'The New Heroes,' a documentary series for PBS - gets a national unveiling starting today and debuts locally at midnight on July 1 on Channel 17, repeating at 9 p.m. July 7."

A campaign encouraging Texas state employees to donate money to charity has recognized the university for its donations.

The State Employee Charitable Campaign awarded UTA with the Top Pacesetter and the Top Per Capita awards, the first time the university has received such honors. The campaign also recognized the university for the highest percentage contribution increase to the campaign and the employees for giving more per employee to charities "

The deceptive actions of the Florida Youth Conservation Corps call into question whether the agency is fulfilling its mission or just making a mint.

A Times Editorial
Published June 28, 2005

The Dade City-based Florida Youth Conservation Corps is grabbing millions of dollars in no-bid government contracts to clean highway rights of way. Its stated mission is to provide training and scholarships to disadvantaged youths, but the most prevalent lessons are deceitful behavior and ducking accountability."

Six agencies recently got state tax credits to give to contributors in the next year. Donations will fund counseling, medical care, housing and other services for needy people in Elkhart County.

'They create a huge bonus for local contributors who want to support the health care center anyway,' said James Gingerich, director of Maple City Health Care Center, which got the maximum $50,000 in credits. 'It really makes a huge difference in our ability to raise funds.'"

WHO says public opinion counts for nothing? The major concessions on Africa’s debt to the tune of $55bn can only be attributed to the huge volume of public concern in recent months.

In Edinburgh recently, as 150 parliamentarians from Japan to Nigeria met to lobby the forthcoming Group of Eight (G-8) meeting, Bob Geldof stole the front pages of the British press by calling for a “reverse Dunkirk” whereby small British boats would fetch French protesters to join the million expected in Edinburgh to coincide with the G-8 meeting in Gleneagles. The atmosphere of expectation in Edinburgh is palpable. Shops are planning to shut down. Police are mobilising in large numbers."

Hong Kong’s billionaire Li Ka Shing, through his philanthropy foundation, has donated US$ 40 million to the University of California at Berkeley as a grant towards research into stem cells and brain imaging technology.

“I am a firm believer in the spirit of public-private partnership, and I am excited by the advanced work Berkeley is undertaking. The work and research being done there will result in phenomenal benefits to mankind,” said Li Ka Shing.

The donation would go towards the US$ 160-million research center that the university has planned. According to sources, the center, whose construction would begin 2007 and be completed by 2009, would be christened Li Ka Shing Center for Biomedical and Health Sciences.
"

Long gone are the days of retiring from the same job you were hired for straight out of school. Moving from job to job is a modern day reality. Sometimes the change is small, while at other times it is monumental; for instance, moving from a successful position in the corporate sector and transitioning into a brand new career in the nonprofit sector. That is exactly the career path of Bibi Patel, director of development and donor services at the Community Foundation of Ottawa, and Michael Howlett, president and CEO of the Canadian Diabetes Association.
Making a strategic move
Patel spent 18 successful years in the high tech sector before moving to the nonprofit world. In 2001, the high tech downturn coupled with a feeling that she had met most of her career goals led Patel to seek new opportunities. 'I had a great experience in the corporate sector so it wasn't about running away from something that wasn't working,' she recalls. 'It was just time to try something different.'
"

In search of personal fulfilment, many city-slicking PAs are swapping the high life for less pay but more job satisfaction in the charitable sector. Cath Janes finds out how

Monday June 27, 2005
The Guardian

Unless you have a strange immunity to tubthumping pop stars, you'll have noticed that the Make Poverty History campaign is having a bit of a do. On Saturday July 2, campaigners and revellers will descend on Edinburgh to demand debt cancellation for the world's poorest countries.

For the estimated 400 charities supporting the event it's the pinnacle of months of hard work. But for the PAs of those charities it's also something personal. 'I want to feel like I am making a difference,' says Nikki Sturridge, PA the director of Cafod, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, which is part of the Make Poverty History Alliance. 'I love knowing that I can help make life better for people caught in conflict or suffering. It helps me sleep better at night.'"

GooglevideoI've confirmed that Monday Google will launch an in-browser video playback feature based on the open source VLC media player. This is the logical next step for Google's video search and upload function, which began taking uploads from anyone who cared to submit back in April.

Google will not disclose the raw numbers of videos that have been uploaded to date, but the company will make all those which were tagged as 'free' available for real time streaming through the VLC player, which Google has modified and will make available for download Monday morning. The company also intends to make its VLC code available to the open source community as part of their Google code project.

The video will be searchable via the meta data provided by the submission process (no, there's no PageRank for video, yet).

ALBERTO VILAR wanted only one thing: to stand alongside John Davidson Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie and Bill Gates as one of America’s greatest philanthropists.

Before he was arrested and handcuffed at Newark airport and thrown into the New York Metropolitan Correction Centre, he seemed to have come achingly close. His fortune was valued at $950 million (£523 million) by Forbes magazine, and his name was engraved into the marble of several world-renowned institutions, including the Royal Opera House in London.

But today, as the fallen financier awaits his trial on four counts of fraud and four counts of money laundering, he is left with only two bank accounts: the first with a balance of less than $100; the other empty. His $10 million bail has been secured against works of art, a friend’s home in the Hamptons, and a $500,000 gift from the conductor Valery Gergiev. Yet remarkably, Mr Vilar’s tale is not a traditional one of corporate greed or stock market trickery. He is not accused of robbing anyone’s pension fund for a Fifth Avenue address and a fleet of canary "

Republicans are calling for a full-blown probe of a Cape Cod pol who raised as much as $10,000 from a charity golf tournament this week and has likely raised thousands more in previous years - without setting up a charity.
The GOP filed a complaint with the State Ethics Commission and Attorney General Tom Reilly's office yesterday against Rep. Demetrius Atsalis, questioning how money from the annual tournament has been spent.
``The public deserves an explanation from Rep. Atsalis because so far his story does not add up,'' Massachusetts GOP Executive Director Tim O'Brien said. "

The arts are in a precarious position in America these days.
The good news is that all over the country, political leaders and everyday citizens alike recognize the role the arts play in creating healthy, liveable communities.
People want to live where artists live, and communities value the vitality that artists bring to a neighborhood, a city and a region.
Certainly, we're seeing that in Maine, in all corners of the state.
The bad news is, our economic systems and structures tend not to support our artists. While artists are feeling less marginalized and there is more social recognition of the role of the artist in society, money hasn't followed.
The arts survive as much by will as anything else."

When the board of the Milwaukee Public Museum gathered in June 2003 to consider an ambitious budget for the 2004 fiscal year starting that September, eight of its then 25 members were in the room.55252Public MuseumMembership

The museum board met only once every two months, and attendance was spotty.Board members often found their private interests and museum responsibilities overlapping.The board's organization concentrated power.Directors acknowledge that they put too much trust and authority in museum managers.Museum Board

The $26 million spending plan, by far the largest in the institution's history, was approved within an hour without change, with seven more directors assenting by phone. Some late-arriving members missed part of the budget presentation."

HoustonChronicle.com - Firms no longer in closet during gay pride parades: "Firms no longer in closet during gay pride parades
From airlines to automakers, corporations help sponsor events
By LISA LEFF
Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO - If it takes a queer eye to notice that the cast of Bravo cable network's Queer Eye for the Straight Guy rides in Volkswagens during New York's gay pride parade, that's just what the automaker intends.
ADVERTISEMENT

Similarly, Wells Fargo hopes the crowds attending San Francisco's gay pride parade get a good look at its employees singing show tunes atop the stagecoach-themed float the bank entered in its hometown event today.
Despite boycott threats from anti-gay groups, and the perception of a gay marriage backlash from the American public, corporate sponsorship of gay pride festivities held around the country in June remains strong this year, according to event organizers and advertising agencies that specialize in reaching gay consumers."

Cherie Blair, the lawyer wife of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has pulled out of a charity event in Malaysia, a Downing Street spokesman said today.
She still plans to deliver a law lecture in Kuala Lumpur on July 25, but will skip a charity event six days later that is part of the gala opening of the Starhill boutique complex.

'Cherie Blair is no longer able to attend the charity event in Malaysia,' the spokesman said.

He added that talks had been under way with Datin Seri Endon Mahmood, the wife of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, on how she and Blair might together 'raise the profile of breast cancer (the subject of the charity event) in Malaysia"

Charity begins at home, especially when it's the home page. Online donations to the United States' biggest charities surged 63 percent last year from 2003, a new study says, as the tsunami relief effort and Howard Dean's presidential campaign underscored the value of Internet fund raising.

The 164 groups surveyed by the Chronicle of Philanthropy included Doctors Without Borders USA, which helped victims of the December tidal wave that devastated Asian nations, and the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

The groups raised a combined $166.2 million online, the trade journal said.

That was less than 1 percent of the total raised by most of the charities. But Chronicle Editor Stacy Palmer says the big growth from 2003 will spur more online fundraising this year as donors grow more comfortable with e-charity.

'We really seem at a stage where growth is happening in a fairly spectacular way,' she says."

Reynolds Foundation retools its grant process - 2005-06-27: "Reynolds Foundation retools its grant processTodd CohenThe Business Journal Serving the Greater Triad AreaTo better explain its goals and ensure more productive results, the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation in Winston-Salem has revamped the form and process that nonprofits use to submit grant requests.

Effective immediately, all nonprofits must submit requests online using a form at www.zsr.org that has been revised to help nonprofits better explain their work and the outcomes they aim to produce with the funds they are seeking. "

No generation in history has affected this nation like the boomers — 76 million babies born between 1946 and 1964.

Thanks to this group's gargantuan size (nearly a third of our population), this moving bulge of bodies, sandwiched between much smaller age groups, has been famously likened to a 'pig in a python.' But size alone doesn't explain their impact. If the boomers had been shy and retiring, it's not likely they would have rocked the nation in so many ways for so many years. Loud, insistent, sassy and self-absorbed, it's their collective personality that stands out ('hell no, I won't go!'), unyielding in their demands for self-actualization and social change.

Alas, it didn't last. Call it midlife sprawl of consciousness or simply midlife, but jobs, family, rampant consumerism and responsibilities quenched the boomers' strident side. They stopped being uppity.

Everyone involved with community service knows that competition for the benefit dollar becomes more ferocious as nonprofits proliferate.

Philanthropy means 'love of the people,' and Fort Worth's most generous givers most certainly do embrace the needs of humankind. They remember the arts, too -- and in a big way.

Tarrant County has more than 250 charitable foundations, an eye-popping number when you consider that the entire state of New Mexico has fewer than five major foundations, says John Robinson, the executive who heads the Amon Carter Foundation, one of the city's largest giving organizations.

DIANA BALDRICA/THE FRESNO BEE
D
Money may appear to grow on trees in the fertile central San Joaquin Valley. But the world's richest agricultural region is reaping a meager harvest when it comes to philanthropy.

'Per capita charitable giving is $450 in San Francisco and $45 in Los Angeles' per year, says Kurt Madden, chief executive officer of One by One Leadership of Fresno, a nonprofit organization dedicated to producing community transformation by getting area citizens involved in urban leadership. 'In Fresno, it's und"

As millions of Americans celebrate the strides of the LGBT community during Pride festivities this month, a little-known report has revealed a weakness in the support structure of the U.S. gay and lesbian movement: charitable funding.The New York-based Funders for Lesbian and Gay Issues (FLGI) studied philanthropic giving by the top 1,000 corporate and private foundations in the United States and found that gay-related groups were underserved. The group released the report in April. "

Cause. And effect? - The Boston Globe - Boston.com - Living / Arts - News: "Cause. And effect?
This time, the musicians behind Live 8 want to open minds, not wallets
By Joan Anderman, Globe Staff | June 26, 2005
On Saturday, several million people will attend the Live 8 concerts: a worldwide series of star-studded shows organized by Live Aid founder Bob Geldof to bring global attention to economic and social crises in Africa.
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Sign up for: Globe Headlines e-mail | Breaking News Alerts Another billion will watch the largest concert event ever staged on television, listen on the radio, or stream it online.
And then what?
Unlike Live Aid, the groundbreaking pair of 1985 concerts that raised $200 million for famine victims in Ethiopia, and Farm Aid, which funds programs that support family-based agriculture in the United States, Live 8 is an awareness-raising event. Tickets are free. Phone banks are nonexistent."